Our culture does not favor people who are not part of the system. Those who are willing to stand alone, if necessary, for their convictions are rare indeed! When one feels alone, Satan would have you play the victim. He is a liar. Being willing to stand alone for the truth is a major character builder. It also makes us like Christ Himself.
Our Lord was left alone in the Garden of Gethsemane when the battle for our souls was at stake. The unbidden blood of lonely stress was the first shed for our souls. The prophet Isaiah saw this 700 years before it happened. Speaking of the cross, Isaiah shared this
“I have trodden the wine press alone and of the people there was none with me…” ~ Isaiah 63:3
Often Jesus would get alone…
“He departed again to the mountain by Himself alone…” ~ John 6:15
When He came away from that “aloneness,” He could walk on water and still storms.
Our culture loves conformity and fears non-conformity. One must go along with the “party line”. One must “go along to get along,” yet there are times when conformity — and even unity — must give way to convictions.
The Reformation exploded in Wittenberg, Germany when Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to the door and said, while standing alone, “Here I stand… God help me, I can do no other.”
Abraham was alone when God gave him the revelation of Isaac.
Moses was alone when a burning bush changed the destiny of a nation.
Jacob was alone when God wrestled him to submission and changed him to Israel.
Isaiah was alone when he saw a vision of God’s throne and received a world changing assignment.
David was alone when he sang the 23rd Psalm.
Jeremiah saw judgment while he said, “I sat alone because of your hand.” (Jeremiah 15:17)
Ezekiel “fell on his face alone” as God spoke to him.
Daniel spoke, “I, Daniel, alone saw the vision…” (Daniel 10:7-8)
John was alone on the Isle of Patmos when the Revelation was unfolded before him.
Standing alone for God means you’re never alone. He stands with those who are willing to stand alone.
Listen to St. Paul in 2 Timothy 4:16-17…
“At my first defense no one stood with me, but all forsook me…
but the Lord stood with me.”
Sometimes standing alone moves you into the company of the Lord and the angels!
In the Academy Award winning movie on the life of Thomas Becket called “Becket,” there is a scene I will never forget. Becket had been King Henry II’s chancellor. With the death of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the King gave Becket that office as leader of the Church of England. For a season, Becket served in both offices. Eventually, he gave up the office as chancellor as his loyalty was now with the Lord and the church. Through tears, King Henry said to Becket, who had been his best friend for 15 years, “I shall learn to be alone.”
As a Baptist preacher, I thought I had many friends. Yet after the Spirit baptized me and I began to operate in all the gifts, those friends vanished. I learned to be alone. I would throw my heart around someone, help someone, and think, “Here is a friend I can call on.” However, as soon as standing with me became difficult, they would leave. I learned to be alone – but alone is not alone. For me, the by-products of standing alone include:
- Intimacy with God
- Power
- 37 books written
- Answered prayer
- Angelic manifestation
I can say for all the lonely days and nights, “The Lord stood with me!”
Pastor Ron
So, I will reset and update, but hold fast to sound teaching rooted in Scripture and ancient church traditions.
Three times since January, 
Our active military forces have been diminished to their lowest point since prior to the end of 
In spite of the dark clouds, I sense an uprising of Americans who are fed up and will pray, act, and bring our nation back from the brink. I see a movement that understands the beliefs that truly did make America great. I hear the voices that echo the call to freedom — physical and spiritual — that can put us back on the rails of goodness, truth, justice, and sanity. Judgment is at the door. Our God is a God of love, compassion, and patience. However, He is also a God of truth, righteousness, and justice. In Romans 2, Paul warned the Christians in Rome…
Many people who read my blog are leaders in either church, community, or business. There are so many different styles and philosophies when it comes to leadership, with countless books, seminars, and self-help videos on the subject. Just typing in “leadership” on YouTube yields over 4.2 million results.
There must be a culture of mutual honor, respect, and teamwork. You cannot be an effective leader from a high and lofty tower. Former President Theodore Roosevelt once said, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” A businessman in my church once told me that “I don’t ask anyone to do something I either haven’t done, or wouldn’t do myself. The people who work for me will do anything for me for one simple reason — because they know I will do anything for them.” Treating people with respect, honoring their time by being prompt and on-time, being forthright and honest, approaching each task with a well-thought-out plan, being conservative with criticism and liberal with praise, letting each individual know how important they are to the organization — all of these things help to build an atmosphere that goes beyond teamwork… it creates the atmosphere of family.
There must be disciplined financial principles that include healthy revenue streams, careful spending, and total accountability. Most organizations crumble because of financial woes. Bad financial planning (insufficient funding), mismanagement, and dishonesty are just a few ways financial problems can doom an organization. Being disciplined with how you spend, how you manage growth, and how you invest your resources will go a long way toward giving you a healthy bottom-line. Being realistic about projections, operating within a well-defined budget, and being an “open book” when it comes to accountability will not only give you a reputation for integrity, but can also provide others with confidence in investing in or donating to your organization.
A few weeks ago, there was a segment on the news where a dozen people were offered – for free – a Hershey chocolate bar or a ten ounce bar of silver. All of them took the candy. The candy bar was worth a dollar or two. The silver bar was worth $142.00 at spot prices on that day. People did not know the value of what was before them. There is a segment on the TV show The O’Reilly Factor (with Bill O’Reilly) called Watters’ World. In this segment, Jesse Watters asks people on the street simple questions about current events, history, and politics. Although often humorous, it is sad that people are so ill informed about this great country in which they live, and — not just our history — but current events as well.
Now we have a socialist being supported by the majority of college students and young adults in the presidential election. We have people worried about transgender bathrooms and the news media making it a big story, while ignoring the slaughter of 250 Christian women and girls in Mosul, a 16 year old beaten to death in an American high school, wild and godless gangs making our cities killing fields, the influx of Islamic radicals, the silencing of a middle school choir singing our National Anthem near the 9/11 memorial, and the continued murder of the unborn through abortion.
Several years ago, I was in Germany where we visited the 
So, I ask the same question… How can we NOT know? How can we not see the truth in front of our eyes? How can we continue to ignore the desperation of the times in which we live? How can we not see the writing on the wall, holding us accountable for our silence while our society slips further into the abyss? We will one day stand before a Holy God and, when asked about all of the souls we allowed to pass into a godless eternity, “We didn’t know” will not be an adequate response.
To hold to the truth of scripture is to be called a bigot. To have a problem with a grown man sharing a bathroom with a young girl is being “intolerant”. To demand that our leaders protect our borders is being “racist”. We are living to see our culture “calling good evil and evil good…” God issued a warning of “woe” to come on such. The worst of it is the awful silence in the contemporary pulpit — the failure to warn the nation. I for one will inform the uninformed, call sin by its proper name, and declare that people need to be saved. I will stand by the truth that the church cannot embrace the lies of culture and remain authentic. We must bear the scandal of the cross and refuse to be silent in the face of evil. We must care enough to speak the truth regardless of how we may be labelled — bigot, homophobe, racist, intolerant. Satan and his forces are stalking our families and communities. It is time to stop letting a liberal culture and media define us for simply believing in something and Someone. It’s time to stop being afraid of “ugly names” and start fearing for the souls of lost men and women heading into a hopeless eternity.
Not according to the Bible. In Luke 15, Jesus tells us a story…
Friend, when was the last time you mourned for the lost? When was the last time your heart broke for those emotionally wounded and bleeding souls who came across your path — possibly through the doors of your church — and left untouched and unchanged? For the Good Shepherd, his reaction was immediate. He didn’t wait until it was convenient. He didn’t wait until he had gotten the ninety-nine to the safety of a barn or pen; the Bible says that he left the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and went after the one. I think the Good Shepherd understood that time was of the essence, and saving the one depended upon his deliberate and swift action.
I’m tired of the LGBT agenda that is being forced upon the American people. Understand me when I say that I don’t believe that anyone should be threatened, abused, or discriminated against because of their lifestyle. However, I do not believe that churches should have to hire someone that promotes a lifestyle contrary to our biblical world view, or be forced to affirm perversion as a “civil right”. While members of the LGBT community should not be oppressed or mistreated, neither should those of us who believe that their lifestyle is a sin be forced to agree with their choices. If you can’t “legislate morality from the (court) bench”, you shouldn’t be able to legislate immorality either.
I’m tired of we, the American taxpayers, being robbed to support leftist causes and wasteful governmental agencies. It infuriates me to see our tax dollars go to failed and failing “green” companies (remember Solyndra) and other “pet
I’m tired of Islamic terrorists being called moderates. When I was young and growing up in the South, there was a religious organization that committed acts of terror in the name of God. They were called the Ku Klux Klan. Yet, the church rose up against them and said, “You’re not Christian… You’re wrong.” It’s time for any moderate Muslims to rise up, call these terrorists for what they are, and affirm the right for Israel to exist in peace.
I am still proud when I hear the sound of our National Anthem being sung at a sporting event.
Dishonesty has been around since the Garden of Eden. 
Someone to believe. We all desire to be spoken the truth.Whether it is a doctor giving us a diagnosis, a politician making campaign promises, or a child explaining how the expensive vase ended up on the floor in a thousand pieces, we all want people to be straight with us. The fact is, however, that we have become accustomed to much less. In politics, lies and “back-room deals” have become expected, and we have grown too complacent to alter the modus operandi. On television, we see dishonesty given a pass — even glorified — as long as it serves some noble purpose, whether on a sitcom or the nightly news. As a pastor, I cannot tell you how many marriages and families I have seen torn apart because of dishonesty and deception.
I would contend that we are not too far gone. I would argue that we are not beyond expecting truth — regardless of how painful — from those around us. Getting back to a place of truth and honesty might be painful for a season, but once we you get there with God’s help, and make that your expectation, you will be amazed at the freedom that accompanies truth. As the saying goes… “The truth will set you free!”
On June 6, 1944, the success of Operation Overlord (what we commonly refer to as D-Day) can be largely attributed to the fact that personnel and equipment were where they were supposed to be, when they were supposed to be there.
Conversely, the failure of Operation Market Garden (famously depicted in the movie A Bridge Too Far) just three months later can be blamed, in large part, on the inability to get men and supplies where they needed to be in order to support troop movements and actions. Although Operation Market Garden was actually a larger operation, it failed to meet it’s objective and expedite the end World War II.
This would imply that David, as king and leader of the army, should have been with his army, Instead, he decided to hang back, and relax in the confines of his palace in Jerusalem. While there was not necessarily anything inherently wrong with being where he was (in his palace), by not being in his proper place, it allowed him to fall into temptation, and subsequently sin with Bathsheba. Not being where he was supposed to be opened the door for sin, and changed the destinies of Uriah the Hittite, Bathsheba, David himself, and an entire nation.
Maybe there is nothing inherently wrong with where you are… it’s just not where you are supposed to be. For me, as a burned-out Southern Baptist preacher in 1989, a perfectly acceptable place for me to be would have been at home with my family. However, where I was supposed to be was in Glorietta, New Mexico. Being there, and my subsequent encounter with the Holy Spirit as a result, changed my future, my ministry, and my life.
The Heart of Abba - Ron Phillips 